


some say love is a burning thing

by myownremedy



Category: The Amazing Spider-Man (Movies - Webb)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Gwen-centric, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-03
Updated: 2014-05-03
Packaged: 2018-01-21 18:15:17
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,412
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1559543
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/myownremedy/pseuds/myownremedy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The world needs spiderman, regardless of who's in the suit.</p><p>Or, the one where Peter dies instead of Gwen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	some say love is a burning thing

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this in a crazed sort of way immediately after seeing the movie. it's unbeta'd, i have next to no comic book knowledge and i have a lot of Gwen Stacy feelings.  
> LOTS OF SPOILERS. Also if you haven't seen the movies, this probably won't make sense. Plot taken mostly from The Amazing Spiderman movies; I borrowed lines from them too.  
> Title from Zola Song by Phosphorescent (which actually played in TASM 2).
> 
> Disclaimer: Y'all fictional, y'all sort of dead, I don't own TASM.  
> edit (4-13-15): this is a transformative work. I make no money off of it. I do not own what inspired this work (The Amazing Spiderman 2), but I do own this work itself and hold full copyright over it. Thank you.
> 
> warnings for: pregnancy, abortion, major character death, minor character death, allusions to ptsd, violence, grieving.

It’s the stuff of clichés, that her father’s death forces Gwen to grow up. She was already on her way – a senior in high school, an intern at Oscorp, the oldest child in her family. It’s not until she attends her father’s funeral, smoothing down her black dress, that she makes a conscious decision.

 _I am an adult now_ , she thinks. _This is what happens when a parent dies._

It bothers her, but not as much as losing her father bothers her. She squeezes her own hands convulsively and sneaks a glance at the skyline, at the buildings that overlook the cemetery. The bagpipes of the police department play _Amazing Grace_ , the notes marching along like the policemen wearing their dress blues, and Gwen plans ahead.

 

Peter doesn’t attend the funeral. Gwen presses frozen spoons on her eyes, swollen from crying, and focuses on breathing. It’s not fair to go from having a father and a boyfriend to have neither.

She doesn’t confront Peter until she’s figured out how to cry without fissuring apart. There’s power in appearance and Gwen embraces it, buttons her long coat and shoves a knitted cap on her head before heading out to Jersey.

“You weren’t there,” she tells him, like he doesn’t already know. Peter’s shoulders are hunched, his head bowed. He was there with her father when he died. He was not there for her. “You weren’t at the funeral. I looked for you but you weren’t there.”

Peter raises miserable eyes to her and Gwen’s world shakes. It’s always shaken whenever she’s looked at Peter, but before it was small enough she could ignore it. Now she fights to stay balanced, gripping the handle of her umbrella like it’s a weapon. Maybe it is.

“He told you to stay away from me,” Gwen whispers and Peter’s face twists. “He made you promise, didn’t he?”

“I’m sorry,” he tells her. He makes no move to go to her. She sucks in a shaky breath and leaves.

 

The next day, Peter is late to class.

“I’m sorry, it won’t happen again,” he tells the teacher earnestly. Peter is good at that, being earnest while talking shit that he doesn’t believe. It’s not a talent Gwen shares.

The teacher smiles. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep.”

Gwen feels his breath on her back when he leans forward. “But they’re so much fun,” Peter breathes, and Gwen smiles.

 

*

 

She shrugs off girlhood like it’s an old skin, unzips it one tooth at a time. Her mother notices but says nothing. They both know that if Gwen needs something, she will ask.

Gwen ends up making the appointment for her IUD herself. It’s efficient, something Gwen appreciates, and it will make her cramps more bearable.

Peter rides with her to the appointment. He holds her hand on the subway train and Gwen can feel his eyes on her – her knee-high socks, her floral dress and complimentary blazer.

“Why do you always dress up?” Peter asks after a minute, scratching his nose. He sounds genuinely curious and she glances at him. “I mean, you’re going to a doctor’s appointment for a procedure that might be painful.” It will be, if they don’t numb her cervix. Gwen has already taken Advil in preparation for this. “Why didn’t you wear yoga pants or something? I’m sure,” he laughs a little, “that no one would mind.”

Gwen smiles. Peter’s hand is warm and she squeezes it. “You have your suit and I have mine.”

His mouth quirks down, the way it always does whenever she mentions him being Spiderman, and he looks away. That’s okay. Gwen didn’t expect him to understand.

 

They have sex for the first time two months after her father’s death. It’s messed up, to count time like that, but Gwen can’t stop herself. She lets Peter press her against a wall and kiss her tenderly, like she’s something he wants to see bloom. She’s the one that finds the condom in his jeans and tugs off his shirt, and he steadies her.

“I want…slow,” he mumbles against her lips. Gwen’s eyes are shut but she knows he’s blushing, so she nods. They trade touch for touch, Peter’s hands huge and gentle against her skin. Gwen loses track where she ends and he begins, only knows that he’s gentle as he carries her to bed and he doesn’t mind when she rakes her nails down her back.

“Does it hurt?” he asks once he’s inside her, lips shiny from going down on her and Gwen laughs.

“No,” she reaches up to lay her hand along his cheek. “It doesn’t hurt if I’m into it, which I am.”

“Oh.” Peter considers that, and smiles. “Good.”

“You can move, you know,” Gwen teases him, and he does.

 

Oscorp’s stock drops after what everyone is calling _the lizard incident_ , then stabilizes. Gwen keeps her job, despite almost dying in the tower. She likes to think she’s too practical for PTSD. She’s well aware that’s not at all how it works.

“Will you continue working for us after you graduate?” Steve, her supervisor, asks and Gwen smiles up at him. She’s at her desk, plotting data points on a graph.

“Maybe,” she spins her chair so she can face him. “If I go to college in the city, then yes.”

“Where else have you applied?”

“Oxford,” Gwen answers. Steve raises his eyebrows at her.

“Wow,” he says. Gwen shrugs and he leaves after that. She doesn’t mind. She has no patience for people who don’t believe in her whole-heartedly.

 

The truth is, she’s not the one that almost died that night. Peter is. Peter almost dies every week, busy saving the city. Some days, he’ll appear at her window, bloody and bruised and kiss her on the lips and smile, pretending like he’s not in pain.

“I heal fast,” he tells her. “Don’t worry about it.”

Other days, he’ll avoid her. Her father’s death marks him like a stain. Gwen wonders if time will wash it away but that’s not how it works, and Peter takes to avoiding her, conscious of his promise.

They argue about it. Gwen is mad because she can’t get too mad at Peter, because he’s trying to do the right thing, but she’s not helpless.

“You’re not going to lose me,” she tells him again and again, staring into his eyes. “ _You’re not going to lose me._ ”

People have left Peter – his parents, his Uncle Ben, his friend Harry Osborn. Almost everyone he’s loved, except for Aunt May. And now, her – he whispers _I love you_ as they’re falling asleep, limbs tangled together and her head on his chest.

Every time he breaks up with her she asks him if he’s breaking up with her to keep her safe or because he wants too.

“I don’t _want_ too,” Peter will protest, eyes red and arms crossed over his chest. Gwen will smile and step forward. “Then we aren’t breaking up.” Somehow, he listens.

It is, she admits to herself, very high school. She tells him as much the day before graduation and Peter grins at her. There’s a cut on her forearm, he spent that afternoon assisting the police with a hostage situation, and Gwen loves so much she feels her heart stutter against her ribs.

“Guess we better change that,” Peter mutters, standing up and grabbing her waist. She goes to him, wrapping her arms around his neck and he kisses her filthily. The blood from his cut is still clotting, and it smears against Gwen’s skin but she doesn’t care. She unbuckles his belt and shoves him onto the bed before climbing onto it herself.

“In a hurry?” Peter asks, face scrunched up with laughter. Gwen pulls off her dress and straddles Peter, grinding her pelvis against his. He groans, head dropping down onto the pillows.

Life’s on fast forward and Gwen preps herself, rubbing circles on her clit while Peter fingers her, middle and pointer finger prodding her g spot repeatedly.

“Okay, okay,” she gasps, slumping forward against him. “I’m ready.”

“Condom?” Peter asks, already dragging his briefs down his thighs and Gwen shakes her head.

“IUD,” she mutters. “Don’t need it. C’mon, wanna feel you.”

She rides him, bracing herself with her hands on his shoulders and his hands around her waist. Peter looks up at her with something like awe in his eyes and that just makes Gwen burn hotter. She fucks herself on his cock and he moves his hips in tandem and lets her take her pleasure. Only after her orgasm does he start to fuck her, pulling her to him by her hips.

“I love you,” Peter’s face is open and honest and Gwen reaches out to touch him. The world is shaking again, a mix between an earthquake and a typhoon and Gwen shuts her eyes as Peter comes.

 

*

 

Peter’s late to graduation, of course. Something about machine guns, a theft of plutonium from Oscorp and the Russian mob. Gwen shuts her eyes and gives her speech anyway, because that’s what she does. The people she loves fling themselves into the path of danger and she carries on.

“You probably feel immortal,” Gwen says, and she doesn’t know if she’s talking to Peter or not. “You should be. We’re graduating. But in truth?” Gwen pauses.

“Time is luck,” she tells her classmates, like she hasn’t spent the last half an hour checking her watch and craning her neck in hopes of seeing Peter. “Time means that life goes fast. Sometimes, too fast.” She can see her mother, smiling, and it hurts all over again because her father isn’t there to watch her graduate. “That’s why we have to try for something, to _live_ for something. Even if it doesn’t work out, that’s why we’re alive, right? To mean something.” She thinks of Peter, swinging through the buildings of New York. “And when it turns out that we aren’t immortal, you have to remember what you’re living for. You have to remember hope. There will be dark days ahead –” Gwen pinches her own wrist but keeps talking, because the specter of her father is there, even if she can’t see him. “But no matter how lost you feel, you must promise me to hold on to hope. Hope will allow you to make a difference, and I _know_ how capable we all are. We have to make a difference. This is our life, and it’s time to live it.” She looks from face to face – from Mary Jane, to Flash, to Miles. “Thank you.”

 

Peter kisses her while accepting his diploma and Gwen lets him. He’s alive, he’s unscathed, and she’s relieved.

“You missed my speech,” she tells him.

“I know, I know,” Peter says. “I’m sorry. I had a bit of a traffic situation.”

“I heard,” Gwen brandishes her phone, the new story already pulled up. “Anyway. You’re coming to dinner, right?”

“What?” Peter is staring at something over her shoulder, face twisting up and Gwen grabs his hand and squeezes. He refocuses on her. “Dinner. Right. What time?”

“Eight. You better be there.”

He smiles at her. “I will.”

 

Gwen breaks up with him outside of the Chinese restaurant. Her family is inside, her coat is unbuttoned and Peter is scuffing his foot against the pavement and talking about seeing her father everywhere.

“I can’t keep living like this,” Gwen tells him, biting her lip so she won’t cry. “I break up with you. _I_ break up with you.”

Peter reacts like she’s punched him in the chest. Against the criminals of New York he’s invincible but here, he’s just another boy and Gwen loves him for it.

She just loves herself more.

“Bye, Peter,” Gwen tells him. She doesn’t look back.

 

*

 

They don’t talk that entire summer. Gwen finds a new restaurant, she likes, somewhere that has really good Korean barbeque, and tries to ignore the flashes of red and blue she sees out of the corner of her eye.

It’s the end of July when she realizes she’s pregnant, despite her IUD. Her clothes don’t fit right and she hasn’t had her period for a while. Last month, she was distracted by Norman Osborn’s death, and crying over Peter, and dreaming about Oxford. But this month? There’s no excuse.

“I don’t want this,” Gwen says, staring down at the pregnancy test in her hands. Her nail polish is chipped, her bangs are too long. Her suit is fraying. “I don’t want this.”

So she takes care of it.

 

There’s something alive inside of her and it’s unwelcome. Gwen schedules an abortion and doesn’t tell Peter. She takes the subway so he can’t follow her. When she comes home and boils water for her hot water bottle, her mother doesn’t ask.

“Pregnancy changes things,” the nurse tells her. “Even though you’re aborting the fetus, it’s cells will stay in your body. Half of the father’s DNA is now in your blood stream, to stay.”

Gwen thinks about saying _I know, I’m going to be a biochemist_. Instead she smiles and nods. She likes the idea that parts of Peter will stay with her forever, parts that he willingly gave her.

The abortion is her choice, but Gwen cries anyway. She spends that weekend crying, with her hot water bottle tucked into the waistband of her sweats, and after two days her mom sits down on the couch with her.

“Oh honey,” her mom says, because Mrs. Stacy isn’t stupid. “Does Peter know?”

Of course her mother wouldn’t scold her for the choice she made. That’s not the Stacy way.

Gwen shakes her head.

“Are you going to tell him?” her mother asks, so gently that Gwen starts crying again.

“I don’t know,” she whispers. “I don’t know.”

 

When Oxford calls and tells her that it’s between her and a kid genius, Gwen realizes she has to see Peter again. It’s not enough to feel her eyes on her back as she walks through the streets of New York. It’s not enough to watch Spiderman on the news.

She calls him while she’s at her desk in Oscorp and listens to his nervous laughter. There are no sirens in the background, which is an improvement. Gwen realizes she’s sort of surprised.

“Let’s get ice cream,” she suggests. “I think we need to hang out.”

“ _Okay, yeah_ ,” Peter says, distorted by the phone. “ _I’ll meet you at 7._ ” There’s a metallic screech. “ _Gotta go!”_

 

The first thing out of his mouth is “you look amazing” and Gwen sucks in a breath because it hurts.

“Sorry for the random outreach,” she laughs nervously, forces herself to smile. Peter smiles back at her. “I just, I thought it was time. For us to be friends.”

“Friends,” Peter sounds like he’s testing the words. “Alright. Well, we’re going to have to have some ground rules.”

“Ground rules?”

“First of all, you need a different laugh. One that’s less adorable.” Gwen giggles despite herself, then changes it, making it a cackle. Peter’s face is scrunched up in a smile and she loves him so fucking much that her chest is burning.

They buy their ice cream – espresso for him, mint chocolate chip for her – and fall into step. “Okay,” Gwen muses. “Then, ground rule: you can’t look at me like that, with your big brown doe eyes.”

Peter stares at her, eyes soft and fond and the world rolls under Gwen’s feet.

 _I can’t tell him_ , she realizes, panicking. _I can’t tell him about the baby. Oh, my god, what if it had his eyes? Oh, my god_. She rubs her nose, trying to stave off a panic attack.

“None of that,” Peter says. “No more cute nose rubbing.” He gestures to his own nose and Gwen seizes on the distraction.

“It’s allergy season!” She protests. Peter is still looking at her, mouth quirked in a small fond smile, and then he takes a step closer. She can feel the heat of him from her. Gwen’s surprised to realize she’s shaking.

“I’m going to London,” she blurts out, even though the words _I was pregnant_ are trying to claw their way out of her throat. “I mean, I might be. Going to Oxford, on a scholarship. It’s between me and this other guy, well he’s fourteen and a freshmen in college already, but – I might get it. I hope I get it.”

Peter blinks at her. His eyes are glassy. This close, she can smell his deodorant and the cologne she bought for him.

“I’m really excited,” Gwen says, blinking back tears. Her lips curve into a smile.

“London,” Peter says quietly. “That’s – London.”

“Yeah,” Gwen mutters. The air smells like burning things and ozone and Peter looks past her. She watches him transition from Peter to Spiderman, and turns to try and see what he’s looking at. When she turns back, he’s gone.

 

*

 

Oscorp is covering up Max’s death and disappearance. Gwen tells Peter all of this in a rush, ignoring his jab about the fact hiding in a maintenance closet is _very cliché_.

“Harry’s dying. He wants my blood. Spiderman’s blood,” Peter says, offering the information like a trade. “He thinks it will save his life. But it could kill him, or worse.” Gwen digests this.

“I met him, you know,” she says. “Max. He worked here, as an electrical engineer. And he was a huge Spiderman fan. Like, fanatic.”

“I didn’t really feel… _loved_ ,” Peter muses. “I felt more burned and electrocuted.”

“Yeah, well, that’s what it feels like to love you,” Gwen doesn’t mean to say it. Peter stares at her, pupils waxing and waning with his breath. Gwen sticks her chin out.

After a minute, Peter steps forward and kisses her. It’s frantic, his thumb pressing against her jawbone and Gwen grabs at his jacket.

“You kissed me,” she accuses him. Peter ducks his head.

“I know, I did,” he agrees. “I shouldn’t have done that. How was it?”

Gwen pretends to think about it. “It felt rushed.”

“Yeah,” Peter nods. “I can do better.”

Gwen thinks, _so I was pregnant with your child_ and shakes her head once, to clear it.

“This is a mess,” Peter says softly, like he’s talking to himself. “Alright, Gwen. You get to the elevators, I’ll distract them.”

He lifts a coffee cup from a maintenance cart and dumps it all over the security guards and Gwen watches from the safety of the elevator. It could be the same elevator she met Max in. It’s not.

Harry’s voice makes her jump. He looks unwell; he’s wearing a scarf wrapped around his neck and circles under his eyes and Gwen tries to calm her racing heart. It’s not fair, for Harry to be twenty and have an illness his company can’t cure. It’s not fair for him to come back into Peter’s life, and then leave again.

“You’re good for Peter,” Harry says. “You help him clarify his choices.”

That sounds like a threat and Gwen forces a smile. The doors open and she forces herself to walk, not run.

“It was nice to meet you,” she tells him. She doesn’t hear his response.

 

*

 

Peter confronts her outside of her exam. Gwen doesn’t have time for this but it’s Peter so she makes time. She loves him, loves him so violently that it’s hard to breath sometimes. If she ever told Peter that he would blame himself, because he’s obsessed with keeping her safe. Maybe Peter has never known love to be violence. Maybe Peter is afraid of love like that, afraid of hurting before he’s been left.

“I just have to tell you one thing,” Peter says, but he tells her a lot of things. “Everything I know about my parents, about my dad? Lies. Harry hates him, you’re leaving…everything is different, now.”

“Peter,” she interrupts, trying to keep her voice quiet. “Peter. I love you, but I’m going to London. It’s important to me.” Peter nods. “What did you want to tell me?”

“Just…good luck,” he says, giving her a double thumbs up. There’s already an ocean between them. It doesn’t matter if she goes to London at this point.

She doesn’t know if she’s relieved or not.

 

Gwen gets the scholarship. She doesn’t allow herself to be surprised. She does allow herself to celebrate.

Then they tell her about summer classes, and that she could move now, and she realizes that’s what she has to do.

Peter isn’t home when she stops by. He doesn’t answer his phone, either. She sits on the steps of his porch and calls him twice before leaving a message.

“I’m doing this because I love you,” she tells the phone. “Maybe we’re on different paths. Maybe this is how it needs to be.” She hangs up before she can say anything more.

 

Her mom helps her pack.

“Wear your favorite thing,” she advises, because the Stacy women understand the power of appearance, understand that clothing can be armor. “And call me when you land.”

“Okay,” Gwen agrees, and hugs her mother goodbye. She wears her favorite purple skirt and her teal coat, because she likes the colors, and lets the cabdriver help her with her bags.

“Where are you going?” the cabdriver asks as they hit traffic, and Gwen meets his eyes in the mirror.

“London,” she says. Then, because she’s proud of herself: “Oxford. I’m a student there.”

“Wow,” the cabdriver says. “Cool.”

“Yeah,” Gwen says, and then someone outside the car shouts _it’s Spiderman!_ and she forgets what they were talking about.

 ** _I LOVE YOU_** is written in web on the opposite bridge.

“Oh my god,” Gwen mutters. Here, in the cab, she was prepared to fly across the world but she can’t do that. Love is a burning thing and she’s burning alive right now, because Peter is so stupid, so demonstrative.

Why now?

She doesn’t care. She leaps out of the cab and runs to the edge of the bridge, craning her neck to see Peter. He snatches her up and they soar over New York together.

 

“Did you get my message?” Peter asks, setting them down on the top of a bridge. Gwen refuses to look down.

“Um, no,” she says, smiling. “What’d it say?”

“You didn’t get it? It’s right there.”

“Can’t make it out.”

“I love you,” Peter says, laughing. “It says ‘I love you.’”

“Oh,” Gwen laughs too, then. She wants to press her face against Peter’s neck, wants to hold on to him and never let go. “I love you, too.”

“I’ve decided I’m tired of the rules,” Peter tells her. “Tired of all the reasons we shouldn’t be together. I know them all and I don’t care. I love you. I want to be with you. _You_ are my path. So, I’m following you to London.”

“London,” Gwen repeats, breath coming in short gasps. Peter touches her face, traces her lips with one gloved finger.

“London,” he agrees. “They have crime there, right?”

Gwen nods, blinking back tears. Peter is still smiling at her, face scrunched up with the force of his joy. “Yes, lots of crime.”

“They have…Jack the Ripper.”

Gwen laughs.

“Hey!” Peter protests. “They haven’t caught Jack the Ripper yet, you know.” He’s still laughing as she buries her face in his chest. He’s still laughing as the power goes out.

 

*

 

Peter left her _webbed_ to a police car. Gwen can forgive him for that – _maybe_ – but she can’t forgive him for rushing into battle by himself. He didn’t even know how to magnetize his web slingers! He needs her to reset the power grid.

She commandeers the police car. The specter of her father sits in the passenger seat. For a while, Gwen imagines the lecture she’d be receiving right now, just to amuse herself. It’s August now and her father’s death has scabbed over. It’s a wound she still bothers sometimes – it hurts no matter the season, but it’s a dull hurt. A good hurt. Something that will make her remember. 

By the time she pulls up to the power plant, Peter is trying to shake off electricity and Max is temporarily down. Peter has hosed him again, but Max is already stirring.

“You _webbed me to a car!_ ” Gwen hisses furiously, hurrying over to Peter.

“You can’t be here, you can’t be here,” he chants as he positions himself between her and Max. “Gwen, I’m serious right now, _you cannot be here right now._ ”

“You need me!” She snaps. “I know how to set up the back up power. _You need me_.”

“I can’t lose you. This is dangerous.”

“This is _my choice_ ,” Gwen sinks steel into her tone. Behind Peter, Max stands. “My choice. Do you understand?”

She can’t see Peter’s eyes behind his mask but she knows him, knows from his sigh that she’s won.

“How do we deal with him?”

“Like a battery. Overload him with power, what will happen?”

“He’ll burst.” Peter takes a step back. “When I say, turn on the generator. No matter what, okay, Gwen? _No matter what._ ”

He’s running towards Max before she can argue, so Gwen turns and lets herself into the control room. There are the charred remains of people and she wastes precious time hunting for the key before finding it and adjusting everything.

Outside, blue electricity is dancing along Peter’s body. He’s tying together the strands of a web and Max is floating in front of him, web attached to him. He’s using the web to torture Peter.

“No,” Gwen whispers, and then Peter is shouting.

“Now, Gwen, do it now!”

She doesn’t want too, because Peter will surely fry alive but she _promised_. She is made of iron and steel and glass, because she does not break promises that will save a city full of people. They’re all burning anyway – she’s burning alive for Peter and he’ll burn alive for everyone in this city, because he loves so much.

She flips the switch and shields her eyes as Peter screams, and screams; as Max explodes. Only when Max is gone and Peter is stirring does Gwen rush to his side, ignoring the slight charring of her coat.

“It’s…over,” Peter slurs, and Gwen wants to rip off his mask. “We did it.” She wants to kiss him.

“You did it,” she tells him, gentle, and then Peter leaps up. He has better senses than she does, better hearing, and Gwen doesn’t argue when he steps in front of her, trying to guard her, trying to herd her back to the control booth.

Something… _horrible_ flies towards them. It’s Harry but it’s not, it’s a Harry that’s been horribly mutated and attached to a suit of armor and a hoverboard, and Gwen is afraid.

  
“Run!” Peter urges her. “ _Run!_ ”

Max, she could help with. This crazy, twisted version of Harry is not something Gwen knows how to deal with, so she backs up, hands in her pockets. In her left pocket is her cellphone. In her right pocket is her dad’s pocket knife, the same knife she used to saw through the web Peter trapped her with.

The goblin Harry looks between her and Peter, and smiles. It’s an awful smile; his teeth are pointed, his lips a sickly green. Gwen shudders.

“So,” he says. “When Spiderman said no, it was really Peter saying no.”

Is there use in denying it? Gwen doesn’t think so.

“I was trying to protect you,” Peter says, holding up his hands. He’s trying to talk Harry down, the way he tried to talk Max down. “The serum will only work with my DNA, Harry. My bloodline, no one else’s.”

“You tell me _now_ ,” Harry hisses. Gwen realizes that he’s tried the serum, that’s why he’s a horrible mutant, why he looks more goblin then human. “You have taken _everything_ from me, so I’m taking everything from you!”

It happens so fast. She doesn’t have time to think.

“RUN!” Peter screams, just as Harry grabs her in two metal hands.

 

He takes her to the top of the clock tower that overlooks the power plant. Peter follows, of course, swinging from web to web until he’s there. Harry is baiting him; he takes Gwen inside the clock tower, where the gears of the clock grind against each other and time moves without rules.

“Look at this!” Harry yells. He’s holding up a contraption that holds three vials and a syringe. “The serum! A failure, a waste!”

“Let her go,” Peter yells back, landing on a nearby gear.

Harry abandons Gwen on top of the clock gear in favor of leaping at Peter and Gwen gasps. The gear she’s on top of is rotating slowly and she waits to leap from it to the next gear, not wanting to fall. They’re at the top of the clock tower and the ground is at least three hundred feet below them.

She’s never liked heights.

It takes Peter a few minutes to switch from being defensive to being on the offense. Gwen remembers thinking that it’s not fair Harry came back into Peter’s life, just to leave again and she thinks that again. Peter is doing everything he can; slinging web, kicking Harry, and Harry just keeps coming.

And then, Harry leaps away from Peter and to Gwen, grabbing her by the neck with one metal hand.

“Say goodbye,” he hisses, and shoves; Gwen falls, knowing Peter will catch her. The web finds her immediately and she holds onto it, not minding the way it pulls at her skin.

“Don’t touch her!” Peter yells at Harry, launching himself at the other man. His fist catches Harry squarely in the jaw and Harry flips. The device with the serum and the syringe tumbles out of it’s holster and Gwen catches it, holding it like scissors with the syringe down.

“Is she everything to you?” Harry hisses. “I will take her from you, like you took everything from me.”

“I’ll die before that happens,” Peter kicks out, his foot slamming into Harry’s midsection.

“Then die!” Harry screams, ducking out from under Peter’s leg and then surging up. Peter dodges a punch.

“You first,” he mutters, and it’s so _Peter_ that Gwen smiles. Harry smiles, made insane by rage. “Not without you,” he snarls, and launches himself at Peter. They fall off of the slowly moving clock gear.

It happens slowly, and way too fast. Gwen doesn’t like things that contradict each other but everything about this contradicts itself. Peter does not shoot a web and surge back up to the clock gear, leaving Harry to fall to his fate. Instead, they crash into the floor at the bottom, far below. Gwen can barely see them and she thrashes on the web, moving back and forth until she swings onto the stairs at the opposite wall. She uses her pocketknife to cut herself free and hurries down the stairs, almost tripping. Surely any moment now, Peter will get up. He survived electrocution. He can survive this.

He doesn’t move when she reaches him. He and Harry are wrapped so tightly around each other that Gwen can’t separate them, so she crouches down next to their bodies and tugs Peter’s mask off.

His head is lolling back at an odd angle, and there’s blood trickling out of his nose.

“No,” Gwen whispers, touching his cheek. “Peter. Peter, c’mon, wake up. _Peter!_ ”

Harry stirs and Gwen jumps back with a muffled scream. He smiles that terrible smile at her, an open wound slicing one cheek.

“He’s dead,” Harry tells her, glee sparkling in his eyes. “I said…” he inhales. The rattling sound of it means broken ribs, ribs that have lodged themselves in his lungs. “Not without you.”

No. “No,” she repeats. “No, he’s not dead. Peter…Peter, please wake up. I need you. Peter,” she’s crying now. “Peter, please.”

The blood drips down his cheek. Gwen crawls forward, ignoring Harry, and kisses him – kisses his lips, his forward, his cheeks.

“How touching,” Harry observes, haughty even now. “Did you always love him? Or did you love Spiderman?”

“Anyone can be Spiderman,” Gwen whispers. “I loved Peter.”

“Anyone?” Harry repeats, and laughs. Blood bubbles at his lips. “I don’t think so. What will New York do when Spiderman dies with me?”

“We’ll kill you,” Gwen whispers, and it’s a promise. If she has to move heaven and earth, she will kill him for taking Peter from her.

“I don’t think that will be necessary.” Harry is still laughing when he dies.

 

*

 

No more Peter.

She doesn’t think she’ll ever get used to this. No more eyes that make her world shake and spin. No more soft touches and scrunch faced smiles. No more unruly hair. No more breaking promises. No more throaty laughter.

His funeral is huge. Almost everyone in New York turns out to mourn Spiderman, who died to save their city. The police bagpipes play and it’s déjà vu; Gwen wonders if her father and Peter are watching.

Aunt May is tiny in her grief and Gwen goes to stand with her. She wraps an arm around the older woman’s shoulders and politely ignores her sobs. Aunt May is someone who can cry in public without feeling guilty. Gwen cannot. She saves her tears for her room.

“He saved my life,” people say, over and over – to themselves, to each other, to her and Aunt May, as if they are thanking Peter through thanking them. Gwen smiles at each and every one of them, because she knows. She knows Peter saved their lives. She knows exactly what he died for.

“I’m sorry,” May sniffles when the funeral ends and the crowd disperses. “I know how much you loved him.”

It’s eating her alive, clawing its way out of her ribs, how much she loves him and Gwen exhales.

“I did,” she manages to say. “I – I did.”

“Come on,” May says, reaching up and patting Gwen’s arm. “Let’s have some coffee.”

 

They take a cab to May’s house and May bustles around the kitchen, making coffee and tea. Gwen sits at the kitchen table, having been ordered not to help, and watches her.

“I was hoping,” May says as they sip their coffee, “that you would look at Peter’s room. Take what you needed.”

“Oh,” Gwen says quietly. She’s crying again, trying to ignore the tears as she sips her coffee. It’s not fair, she thinks for the thousandth time, that Peter is dead and she is not. That there has been so much grief in this house, in this life. “I’d like that.”

“Go ahead,” Aunt May says, nodding at the stairs. “Take as long as you like.”

 

Gwen climbs the stairs slowly, carefully. She’s seen Peter rush down these stairs about a hundred times and she takes none of it for granted, anymore – this is a place he lived, and touched, and breathed.

His room is messy. It’s always been messy. Gwen shuts the door and sinks onto the bed, grabbing his pillow and bringing it to her nose. She inhales deeply, tears welling up in her eyes. It takes her a few minutes to pull herself together, but May is just downstairs and Gwen isn’t ready to cry yet. To mourn yet. To let him go.

She gets up and wanders over to his closet, opening the door. His favorite hoodie, his pea coat, all of his different shoes – all thrown in there haphazardly. On the middle shelf is a spare Spiderman suit, folded up neatly. Gwen ignores it in favor of the hoodie, and clutches it to her chest. She turns, walks to his desk. His laptop is open and charged, a flash drive plugged in and Gwen taps the track pad out of curiosity.

It’s her speech.

She sinks down into the desk chair and watches herself speak. 

“ _\- and when it turns out we aren’t immortal, you have to remember what you’re living for. You have to remember hope. There will be dark days ahead, but no matter how lost you feel, you must promise me to hold on to hope.”_

“How?” Gwen asks herself. The recording keeps playing.

“ _Hope will allow you to make a difference, and I_ know _how capable we all are. We have to make a difference. This is our life, and it’s time to live it.”_

Gwen hits pause and stares at the screen, at her smiling, self-assured self.

“I don’t know,” she confesses to the empty room. “I don’t know anymore. Peter was my hope. Spiderman was the city’s hope. And I don’t know how to make a difference without him.”

She spins the chair lazily, foot dragging against the carpet, and her gaze lands on her coat.

The syringe device is still in her coat pocket; she hadn’t know what else to do with it, didn’t want to leave it somewhere in case her mother found it.

She remembers Peter trying to calm Harry down, remembers him saying _the serum will only work with my DNA, Harry. My bloodline, no one else’s._

She remembers the nurse at the abortion clinic, explaining how pregnancy changes things. _Even though you’re aborting the fetus, its cells will stay in your body. Half of the father’s DNA is now in your blood stream, to stay._

“Spiderman was the city’s hope,” Gwen says quietly. Maybe she’s dreaming. She doesn’t know, doesn’t stop to check; she loads the syringe and pushes up her sleeve before injecting herself. The serum drains into her blood stream and Gwen feels the rush of it immediately, something heady and powerful and uncomfortable. She wants to shuck her skin, to find something new, but she can’t. Instead she falls out of the chair and lays on the floor, letting the serum warp her, letting it change her. There’s fire in her now, under her skin, curling around her bones and Gwen gasps and shakes. She doesn’t question it, lets the serum change her until she is something shiny and new, something different.

“Oh, Peter,” she whispers when it’s done. The future is stretching out ahead of her and the headlines blur together in her mind’s eye – _a new Spiderman?! Spiderman not dead?!_ Images rush towards her. Her, staying in New York. Her, graduating from Columbia. Her, carrying on Peter’s legacy. Her, creating hope.

“Peter,” Gwen whispers again. “I miss you.”

She lets go.

**Author's Note:**

> The fact that your baby's cells stay in your bloodstream even after you've delivered the baby is true. However, I don't think this would be enough for Gwen to survive being injected with the serum. So take this science with a grain of salt, because it's questionable. I am not a biochemist. Please do not try this at home.
> 
> [visit me on tumblr!](http://marnz.tumblr.com/) prompts welcome.


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